School Lunch Lady Fired for Giving Free Lunches to Needy Student

Given the time of year, you might think that helping the needy would be encouraged. But that's not what happened when 60-year-old school cafeteria worker Dianne Brame gave free lunches to a student who couldn't afford them. Instead, she was fired.

According to reports, Brame, a worker at Hudson Elementary School in Missouri, had been sneaking lunches to a fourth grader who often had no money. When Brame saw that the child usually had a plain cheese sandwich for lunch, which is doled out to kids who can't afford anything else, she decided to do something.

"Kids can be cruel to see this kid eating cheese sandwiches day after day after day. [They said,] 'You don’t have any money in your account, that’s why you have to eat cheese sandwiches.' And my heart just couldn’t tolerate that, so I broke the rule," she said.

When Brame's employers found out about the free lunches, they accused her of stealing. So, they gave her the choice of taking a demotion at another school or losing her job altogether. Since Brame has no car and couldn't work at a school further away, she reluctantly took the firing.

But when the community learned about Brame's acts of kindness, a huge outpouring came forth and she was reinstated by her employers, who described the incident as "an unfortunate misunderstanding."

What do you think? Did Brame deserve to be fired? Or was she simply helping a child in need?